Pamela Cruz. Peninsula 360 Press [P360P].
The administration of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris has an opportunity to take bold steps to issue executive orders and rescind the harmful actions that the Donald Trump administration has taken against immigrant workers, according to the Migration that Works organization.
The first 100 days of the incoming administration will come at a time of serious public health risks, due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the influenza season, as well as regulations that have been detrimental to migrant workers.
Migration that Works points out in the report called "Prevention of Abuse of Internationally Hired Workers" that between 700,000 and 900,000 immigrant workers enter the United States each year on a temporary work visa.
However, a large proportion are subject to a temporary work visa system that is plagued by labour abuses, including fraud, discrimination and forced labour, and they may even find themselves in difficult situations when they decide to file a complaint, because their source of income depends on it.
During the last five and a half years, more than 4,315 victims of labor trafficking with temporary work visas were reported to the National Human Trafficking Hotline in the United States, although there could be many more.
Therefore, the protection of this vital workforce must be ensured by providing specific recommendations for administrative and legislative action, as well as an immediate rollback of the xenophobic, racist and anti-immigrant rules and policies implemented by the Trump administration.
Among some of these, Migration that Works recommends rescinding all executive orders suspending immigration or prohibiting entry to workers from specific countries, as well as limitations on the Department of Labor's certifications of U and T visa applicants' cooperation with law enforcement.
Also, public charge rules and forms imposing a wealth test for immigrants and non-immigrants, as well as the rule issued by the Department of Labor freezing the wages of foreign farm workers covered by the H2A visa program, should be rescinded.
Similarly, immigration raids on workplaces, social networking data collection for immigrant and non-immigrant visa applicants, and the issuance of Social Security "no-match" letters to employers should be discontinued.
In addition, USCIS rules that temporarily grant employers more flexibility in hiring H-2A and H-2B should be reviewed to determine whether continued employment is warranted, and the Department of Labor's rule that increases current wages to protect the current H-1B workforce and avoid misclassification.
Finally, the Department of Agriculture's farm labor survey should be restored to establish H-2A25 wage rates, as well as Customs and Border Protection awards for intra-company transferees with specialized skills.
